Quickly:

Carolyn Walker said she has been cleaning the convention center for 13 years. She had been making $8 per hour until a few years ago, when the cleaning contract went to another company, Cleanevent USA. The new company meant a new, downsized paycheck. She’s now making minimum wage — $7.67 per hour. But that wasn’t the only hit to her wallet.

Walker said the company charges her $6 per week for uniforms. “It stinks to tell you the truth,” she said. “We work very hard.” It effectively means she’s making less than Florida’s minimum wage.

Less than minimum wage. It takes an hour of Carolyn’s working to pay for the uniform she has to wear in order to keep working.

Asked about the details of his paycheck, one worker, who refused to give a name, replied “So much money for the haves and so little money for the have-nots. I want you to note that distinction.”

In 6 years of running for president what has Mitt Romney promised to do to help these people? Absolutely nothing. Not a single thing. Sure you can remind him of their existence and he’ll praise them to high heaven but nunca thanks. He wouldn’t dare.

Even more from the political geniuses, because you really wanted to hear it. Here’s everything you didn’t know about reality after the Wisconsin recall. A little something where lying, masked, prances absurdly as knowledge.

June 7, 2012 8:00 P.M.
What Wisconsin Means
Reality was on the side of the governor.
By Charles Krauthammer | National Review

But first we interrupt, to dispense with trivia or Chuckle-pretensions. President Obama can’t win anything ever again. Why? Because? The recall was a loser. So his public life is over, kaput. Goodbye, the good man I voted for. It’s a simple but powerful fact, like nenny nenny hee or BOOYAH. The corollary: If Barrett had somehow won, Republicans would have tarred and feathered the Romney campaign. No one wants to participate in the embarrassment of Obambi winning all 50 states. What a lucky thing Romney will be dispensing the acrid humiliation forever, from now on.

Also: Labor unions are dead.

Tuesday, June 5, 2012, will be remembered as the beginning of the long decline of the public-sector union. It will follow, and parallel, the shrinking of private-sector unions, now down to less than 7 percent of American workers.

Au revoir, bullies. Though they’re a tiny fraction of the voters, they dictate their politics to millions. The Nazi Bluecollars tried to determine the outcome of the 2010 election, but they failed. Ha ha. Then they failed to secure the recall, and a thunderclap rang out and the unions died. Right? Would I be lying?

The abject failure of the unions to recall Wisconsin governor Scott Walker — the first such failure in U.S. history — marks the Icarus moment of government-union power. Wax wings melted, there’s nowhere to go but down.

Then they all flew to the sun, and they got there because frankly they know how things work. It’s Hebris I tell you. Much respect thanks humble narrator, Charles Emerson Krauthammer the Eleventy.

Republicans are serious people, aren’t they? Republican politicians are especially serious types. The Governor of the 7th largest state would be one of those people. While the world is going to hell (now), count on him to focus on the issues that affect our lives.

John Kasich (R) on Monday issued a resolution proclaiming the NBA champion Dallas Mavericks “honorary Ohioans” since “the proud city of Cleveland and the entire state of Ohio share the excitement of Dallas Mavericks fans everywhere.”

Well, who would know Ohio better than Kasich? No one. Ohioans just love another state, I guess. Kasich will issue a similar proclamation when the Longhorns beat the Buckeyes for college football’s national championship.

Or the governor could be petty. Maybe he’s spiting a 26 year-old basketball pro, LeBron James? Seems an unbelievably childish thing to do, don’t you think? Using the power of the governor’s office to issue a statewide proclamation just to hurt one young athlete?

“[Dirk] Nowitzki chose to re-sign with the Dallas Mavericks in the summer of 2010, forgoing free agency and keeping his talents in Dallas, thus remaining loyal to the team, city and fans for whom he played his entire career,” he wrote.

Yep, the governor is petty. A petty governor would not be a good thing. Here:

During a speech before Ashtabula County Republicans in March 2009, Kasich talked about the need to “break the back of organized labor in the schools,” according to the Ashtabula Star Beacon.

Organized labor in the schools would hardly be a deserving target. Teachers, really? I don’t think so.

Gov. John Kasich on Thursday signed into law a limit on the collective bargaining rights of 350,000 public workers . .

It applies to teachers, nurses and many other government workers, including police and firefighters . .

Nurses, cops and firemen? These hard working, salt-of-the-Earth types are not causing America’s problems. That’s beyond obvious.

But Kasich doesn’t care. Who really cares about governance anyway? The people are angry, they want vengeance. So, he’s happy to oblige.

add: Illustrations. Populist pandering only comically replaces substance and intelligence.

“I grew up in a blue-collar family in a community dominated by organized labor,” he said. “I consider organized labor to be positive.”

He must be joking.

Kasich said marriage “is between a man and a woman,” and he supported the 2004 amendment to Ohio’s Constitution defining it as such.

He’s less definite on civil unions, saying only: “I don’t support discrimination. I don’t get into that.”

Who would discriminate? Not John.

Kasich’s not sure about Ohio law that allows gay couples to adopt children: “I’m really sort of uncertain about it … I don’t have a firm position on that.”

Hmm, doesn’t know what to think. But when you know what to think, he will too.

These guys have to be idiots, really. They could get away with it anyway.

But they’ve just got to fit themselves for halos. While they’re bashing all these vulnerable Americans, they’ve got to excuse it as if it’s the right thing to do. Puh-leeze. They must know what they’re doing is wrong. Otherwise, why bother?

Sure, let’s take away federal government food stamps from families where even one worker chooses to go on strike:

STRIKING WORKERS INELIGIBLE. — Not-withstanding any other provision of law, no member of a family unit shall participate in the food stamp program at any time that any able-bodied work eligible adult member of such household is on strike as defined in the Labor Management Relations Act . .

WOW. What the hell is that about? It’s to “provide information on total spending on means-tested welfare programs, to provide additional work requirements BLAH BLAH . . “ Oh, well then that’s fine. God knows the average American deplores the paucity of ‘means testing.’ Time to snatch food stamps out of the hands of poor children. I’m sure that’s exactly what you asked your Republican Representatives, guys like Louie “terror babies” Gohmert, to do.

Considering one out of seven Americans qualifies for food stamps during the Great Republican Recession, this sounds suspiciously like an employer-sponsored attack on their poorest wage slaves. Because it is. The people who strike are the folks sick and tired of being paid crap, who are also the ones relying upon the government to help with the kids’ food bills.

It’s a diabolical trap. If you’re a poor, working schlub, the government demands you be quiet and humble or they’ll hurt your kids. Sounds like good government, doesn’t it? God knows this is about good government.

Florida Senate panel approves plan to drug test welfare recipients
Stephen C. Webster | March 24th, 2011

A bill to mandate drug tests for welfare recipients was unanimously approved by a Florida Senate panel earlier this week, putting the proposal one step closer to coming up for a full Senate vote of approval.

The legislation, S.B. 556, would also require that welfare applicants pay for their own drug test before they can be approved for any state assistance.

If you’re hurting, busted up, mentally ill, stressed out, psyched out, sleepless, recently dumped, widowed, depressed, destitute, hopeless or jobless, better straighten up and fly right. Time for noses to be extra-clean.

Say, why can’t a two-bit scumbag like you go to a doctor? Why can’t you see a psychiatrist? Sheesh. Fine, whatever, take your chances. That’ll be $35, incidentally.

Dovetailing on the bill’s progress through the Senate committee on Tuesday, Scott also issued an executive order requiring that all state employees be subjected to urine analysis once every quarter, with random screenings throughout.

So the poor folks in line down at the welfare office will get their checks from the working poor across the counter. And they’ll all be prodded, probed, pushed around, and piss-tested by Big Brother. I don’t imagine any brawls breaking out. Because this is great government.

Maine Takes Down Labor Mural
by Susan Sharon | March 24, 2011

Labor leaders in Maine are outraged over a decision by Republican Gov. Paul LePage and his new administration to remove a 35-foot mural from the Maine Department of Labor. The mural depicts scenes from Maine’s labor history, including a strike at a shoe factory and a paper mill as well as Rosie the Riveter. A spokeswoman for the governor says all departments in state government need to make all people feel welcome — and the mural does not do that.

What? A labor mural? “Look, there’s that painting of working people. Boy, I feel lonely.” Oh, c’mon.

LePage’s administration said they had received complaints from business owners who objected to the mural’s allegedly pro-labor undertones.

Well, that’s a telling statement. Maine employers see the world as a giant war. If you like workers, then you hate employers, simple as that. If, say, you, or your Dad, ever hired anybody, you probably detested that painting. Psychology 101. Never figured an asshole Republican like Paul LePage to be such a wilting flower. Good government, after all, is about taking everybody’s most trivial feelings into account. The thousands and thousands of them, what a task . .

. . LePage has so far produced just a single complaint — an anonymous fax, a copy of which was released today.

Ha!

LePage’s office now says that it was “a letter, not a fax.” . . However, this point from Seitz-Wald still stands: “. . why is LePage making policy decisions based on a single [letter] from an anonymous ‘Secret Admirer’?”

Okay, it was only one person’s feelings. One anonymous person’s feelings. Still, we don’t wanna gang up on that person.

Governor PAUL LEPAGE: . . the mural sends a message that we’re one-sided and I don’t want to send that message.

No, not that anti-business, pro-Rosie the Riveter message. When your Governor gets an anonymous letter from Prime Minister Tojo, he gets results, and that’s fantastic government.